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Fringe 2007 Reviews (9)
The Tail of Rampant Rabbit
Washing Line Productions
C Soco Venue 348
*****
We all dream of stumbling on a fantastic new act. And we wade around
in the dross. No more, get yourselves to C Soco for Rampant Rabbit.
Last night I decided to award four stars. This morning, in retrospect,
there's no question, this is a five star show.
Four women and one man present a sequence of sketches, dance, tableaux
and... well, and that most sought after essence of Fringe - 'different
stuff!'
The performers are all mind-blowingly good - funny, challenging, insightful.
There's not one of this group that couldn't wipe the floor with any
half dozen of most performers around. They've drawn on obviously deep
resources of intelligence, perception, talent and energy. And they've
worked long and hard to create a show which dazzles and unifies a diverse
audience with laughter and the shock of recognized truths. They are
masters of the unexpected word, movement, grimace.
Four stars last night? Well the show is ten minutes too long, some
tough editing is needed. And the featured short bursts of film get in
the way and add nothing.
On the other hand the great five star glory of The Tail of Rampant
Rabbit is its absolute freshness of presentation and vision. Not
to mention some very mean jokes and up front treatment of female masturbation
and what have you that never, really never ever, tumble over into obscenity
or bad taste. If they are this good now - what of tomorrow?
Ray Brown
Shakespeare Bingo A
Comedy of Errors
Running Torch
Bedlam
*
High-school graduate productions of Shakespeare are standard fare.
It’s easy to see why they’re so popular the scripts
provides both enough of a challenge to showcase actors’ talent
and a blank canvas for budding directors to experiment with weird and
wonderful ideas.
In this sense, the bingo concept could have been an interesting new
twist. On the way in, audience members are issued with “Bardo”
scorecards and invited to cross off the different things they see along
the way in Running Torch’s abridged version of A Comedy of Errors.
However, these are not all strictly Shakespearean features (“Woof
woof it’s a Shakespearean dog” and “It’s the comedy
doctor” appear on the card) and it soon becomes apparent that the
company have devised their own “embellishments” to the script.
Whilst the colourful costumes cartoon versions of Elizabethan
doublet and hose are wacky and fun, the puerility angle is taken
a little too far. Not only do extra-textual asides about bodily functions
form an incessant motif throughout the show, the costume designer has
also chosen to adorn the female members of the cast with giant cloth
dildos and the male members with exaggerated cone bras.
Although the confident cast all have acting potential, this crass and
ill-conceived production doesn’t bring anything witty, original
or interesting to its subject matter.
Lucy Ribchester
Shackled
Understairs Arts
Understairs@EuroScot
***(*)
Its always a surprise when a show opens upon a naked man, but in the
case of Fergus Ford's latest play, it more or less underlines the rest
of the action with a sense that the audience should be prepared to be
surprised. The piece begins with a simple premise: two young men wake
up naked in bed together linked at the wrist by a length of chain and
with no memory of the day before. It's from this odd startpoint that
the two must discover who did this to them and why, without arousing
suspicion or being seen by anyone else; and its from here that the comedy
and the drama both unfold.
As Alex and Stuart respectively; Phillip Dunning and Brian Hook work
well together, both inhabiting their roles with an ease that will make
you feel more than uncomfortable as the play nears its final moments:
Hook, with a throwaway carelessness that utterly befits his character's
callous disregard, and a more introspective and searching turn from
Dunning. Playing off each other, they manage an uneasy rapport which
propels the events onward and helps to prevent the precarious tension
of the situation from dissipating in the earlier parts of the play.
What came as the biggest surprise in this case was a rapid change in
tone after a plot turn that alters how the audience perceive the situation.
However this comes just slightly too far beyond the point at which the
audience has consigned the play to being little more than a situational
comedy. The play suffers for it, as the pair of enchained youths end
up giving unsatisfying half-reasons to explain their lack of activity,
and instead begin randomly chatting. While these conversations are well
written, and serve a purpose in defining the characters they do little
to explain the characters' relative inaction, and unwillingness to escape
the predicament. Otherwise this is a shocking entertaining piece of
new theatre well worth the attention.
Graeme Strachan
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